The Us in Unit Cohesion
by Polly Lynn
Summary: Castle just can't let Beckett's comment go. Missing scene for "Pandora." One shot.


Title: The "Us" in Unit Cohesion

Word Count: 3000

Rating: T (language, mildish adult situations)

Spoilers: Pandora

A/N: This was the gift that the compulsion fairy dropped on me in mid-March or so: Castle being affronted, indignant at Beckett's crack about how he looks at Sophia. It's AU in the sense that it really can't fit in the timeline of that episode. Also because I'm never sure if the windows in Castle's office actually overlook the street directly or if there's some kind of balcony outside them. But hopefully not too OOC.

* * *

The book is finished. Castle knows that. And given that it's probably the best thing he's ever written, he really should leave it alone. Especially since the casualties are piling up tonight.

He runs his thumb roughly over the jagged crack in the heavy base of his rocks glass, annoyed that it's still in one piece, but ruined nonetheless. _Well, there's a metaphor for you. _

The steadily blinking cursor captures his attention again. He sets the glass down with perverse gentleness and tries to ignore the irregular hitch of the injured spacebar as he fills the screen, then empties it. Over and over.

He used to be good at this. Mining the anger, the anguish—whatever emotion was floating conveniently close to the surface, waiting to be turned and shaped and burnished under his fingers. Twenty-plus best sellers excavated from his own failures, disappointments, heartbreaks.

Then this, the best of them all, coaxed out of a single moment of hope.

Castle clicks "undo" a final time and closes the document. He used to be good at this, he tells himself again. One hand twitches toward the mouse. The other slams the lid of the laptop. He winces as the spacebar crunches against the screen.

He pushes back from the desk and makes his way toward the windows. Scotch and words have failed him. The city never lets him down.

He presses his forehead to the glass and angles his chin to his chest. He counts the cabs on Broome. One, two in a row, a long pause, and one more. _Probably after 2 then. _ It's a game he hasn't played in years, but he checks his watch anyway. It's just before 1.

He reaches for the anger and comes up empty. Surprised, he jerks back too quickly and

stumbles. The rocks glass died in the line of duty and he's not exactly steady on his feet.

He gropes his way across the room and drops into an armchair. He _is _angry, isn't he? He must be. The unfairness of it all. The sheer _nerve _ of her.

But it's no good. The anger simply isn't there.

He knows that he still _can _be angry with her, and that's a mercy. He just . . . isn't. Which must be why he can't write, can't work the case, can't even drink himself to sleep without posing an imminent threat to the glassware.

Because he might not be angry, but he's far from happy with her. Far from happy with the monosyllabic treatment in the car, the pointed, "See you . . . sometime, Castle," as she slammed the door of the cab. A cab she no doubt wouldn't even have deigned to share with him if Jones hadn't dumped them in the middle of nowhere. And even before any of _that_ . . .

It hits him suddenly, and he lurches out of the chair. With an effort, he stands straight and gets his bearings. He scoops his keys from the corner of the desk and into his pocket and reaches for his jacket.

He's not angry, he's _indignant_.

* * *

Kate wishes that she were the kind of woman who could cry it out. But she isn't, so she sloshes another generous helping of wine into her glass and curses her mostly empty notepad.

She's pulled the basics on Gary Harper and Tracy McGrath from her memory and gotten them down. Blakely sits in the margins, taunting her with the possibility that he's the key to everything and he's out of her reach. In the _sensitive _area. Now she's ignoring how wrong her handwriting looks against the yellow page. Notepads are his territory.

She sips at her wine and taps out a rhythm with the pen. A thought blooms. She stops herself from turning to toss a comment over her right shoulder. But only just.

She used to be good at this. Working alone. Blessed relief when Montgomery pegged her as a solitary creature. Gave her Esposito, then Ryan, and let her hunt. No wasting time catching people up. No justifying her instincts.

She should be burning through the possibilities. Halfway done with a foolproof trap that Gage will walk right into. Instead, she feels slow. Dull. Patterns float up and dissolve back into chaos. Theories die on her lips.

When did she start needing him for _everything_?

The thought has her reeling. She sees Sophia Turner's fingers toying with his lapels and fantasizes about setting fire to the jacket. With or without him in it. She hasn't decided yet.

She tears the top page from the notepad with a savage jerk. Her fingers twitch, about to crumple it into oblivion, when she spies the candle still burning next to the mostly empty wine bottle. (Lanie swears by crying it out. Beckett had been determined to give it the old college try.)

She scoops the candle toward her. Hisses as the cheap glass sears her palm. She holds the corner of the page to the flame and watches, fascinated, as it curls to brown, then black. The flame licks along the paper's edge. The ink shrinks away and the fire chases. Smoke gathers and climbs over her fingers. It's viscerally satisfying.

She's so fixated on the conflagration, she actually jumps at the knock on the door. The last of the paper flares and pops, raining hot ashes on to her skin.

"_Fuck!" _

She brushes herself off. Swears again as a fat orange cinder scorches the pale wood of the table. Another knock. Relatively quiet, but insistent. The kind of knock she knows will get louder and louder.

"_Damn_ it, Castle," she says between her teeth. Because it's him. Who else would it be?

She has a sudden vision of some CIA jackass in a bad suit, black bag in his hand and a self-important smirk all over his forgettable face. She snatches the fireplace lighter from the coffee table and heads to the door on not-entirely-steady feet.

A quick glance through the peephole reveals Castle, not looking too steady himself. She rolls off the door and presses her back against the wall beside it.

"_Fuck!_" she repeats.

He knocks again, louder this time.

She's torn. She wants to wait for his opening salvo—and, really, it's Castle: How long can he keep his mouth shut?—but she doesn't want him to wake the neighbors.

He's still knocking, she realizes suddenly. And he still hasn't said a word. Unprecedented restraint. And _god, _she hates to be the one to flinch.

A lull. She hopes he's given up. She's afraid he's given up. She hears the sound of a deadbolt being thrown. Evelyn across the hall. She flips herself off the wall. Unfastens the locks in three practiced moves and jerks the door open.

He looks completely bewildered. It's adorable. _Adorable?_ No. She's pissed. _Not_ adorable. She snags the sleeve of his coat (_that _coat) and pulls him inside. She muscles the door shut half a second after Evelyn's long nose peeps out from under her security chain.

"What do you want, Castle?" It's more plea than demand. God, she's sinking fast.

He doesn't seem to notice. He rubs at the stubble on his chin. Opens and closes his mouth, once, twice. He's still got that utterly baffled look on his face. It's doing nothing for her focus.

"Wasn't meant to be a stumper," she crosses her arms. The rough fabric of her sweatshirt scrapes unpleasantly over the new burn. The lighter pokes her armpit. She feels like an idiot and takes it out on him, "You've been drinking."

The accusation startles him into speech, "So have you!" He wrinkles his nose and leans toward her. Takes a sniff, "_And _burning things."

She would very much like to slap the triumphant look off his face, but she refuses to descend into cliché. She settles for tossing the fireplace lighter on to the hall table, "Don't worry. Nothing that would've saved the world."

He's not drunk enough to miss the sarcasm. He'd have to be very drunk indeed to miss the sarcasm, "I didn't come here to fight."

Beckett thinks that's a damned shame. A fight is _exactly_ what she needs right now. She narrows her eyes at him, "So, what? You came here to wake up my neighbors? Make sure I wasn't compromising national security by doing my _job?_"

He doesn't rise to the bait.

There's something off about him altogether. He can't seem to stand still, but it's not his usual childlike excitement. He fidgets with a loose button on that damned jacket. Stuffs his hands in his pockets and pulls them out again almost immediately.

She sees the effort it takes to still himself. His jaw settles into a familiar, stubborn angle. She's completely unprepared for the moment when he meets her eyes.

There's an intensity there that he usually spares her. Her heart constricts painfully. Stutters to catch up again as the thought flicks through her mind. He _spares_ her.

But not tonight.

She falters.

"How do I look at her, Kate?" The question is quiet, but there's steel beneath.

"What?" Her voice is barely there.

He takes a step toward her, "How do I look at her?"

Another step halves the distance between them again. He's on the verge of her personal space.

What the hell does he think he's doing? She straightens. Her back to the living room, she angles her shoulders to occupy the width of the hallway. This has gone far enough, "Castle, I'm tired . . ."

"So am I," it's not confrontational, but not apologetic either. And he's not looking away, "So tell me how I look at her."

This close, and without benefit of heels, his height advantage is obvious. He's never this close. Not for this long. _He's breaking the rules_, she thinks petulantly.

She still still hasn't said anything. He takes another step. Finally breaks eye contact to study her from head to toe. It's not an improvement as far as her equilibrium goes.

"Castle," she shifts on her feet, torn between pushing him back and sliding her hands under his jacket to close the distance.

He looms over her, no sign that he's even heard her. He lowers his head. Turns his face toward her. His breath whispers over her cheek. Steady. In and out. She wonders how he does it. She's not breathing at all.

"Do I look at her like . . ."

Finally. A hitch in his voice. _Some _sign that he's as undoneas she is. As she's been since she heard Sophia's name on his lips.

She makes a noise. Tells herself it's not a whimper.

He rushes on, encouraged, " . . . like my heart doesn't start beating until I see her every morning?"

_Now_ she's breathing. He's not touching her. Very pointedly not touching her. And her hands are safely knotted behind her back. There's no chance of her doing something stupid.

And then his lips land just in front of her ear. Press against the skin there, heavy and deliberate, "Like I want to be the kind of man she wants?"

He finds the prominence of her cheekbone and rests there. Now she's the one breathing in, breathing out like the sunrise depended on it.

He's shaking. His lips move on and his voice breaks against the corner of her mouth, "Like I would die happy if she were the last thing I saw in this world."

She's finished. Her head tips back. Fingers, palm, the heel of her right hand travel up, over, across the expanse of his torso. Belt to collar, she eradicates every trace of Sophia. Her fingernails stack, one on top of the other, sharp and insistent along the back of his neck. She is kissing him, again and again. Firm, brief.

He hesitates. A ragged version of her name hangs in the air between them.

She shakes her head. Wards it off. Her left hand sweeps up to his shoulder. She stumbles. Her back meets the wall and she tugs at him.

He doesn't follow. Not at first. Not until she ducks her head into the hard right angle of his jaw and uses her teeth.

One minute his hands are dangling by his sides, the next they converge on her spine. He bunches her sweatshirt up out of the way. One hand kneads the muscle between her shoulder blades, the other rakes over the skin of her lower back.

She can't get at him. Not like she wants. He's using his weight advantage to keep her in place.

She's had just about enough of that. Her left arm wraps hard around his neck. She curls her tailbone away from the wall, raises up on her toes to press herself against him.

He gasps. Sees fire, white and blue, behind his eyelids. Suddenly he's pinned in the corner between the door and the wall. His hands try to find purchase on some part of her, but he can't keep up.

She's clawing at his jacket. She jerks one shoulder, then the other toward her, wrestles it down his arms, past his hands.

She pulls back from him all at once. His eyes fly open. He blinks, trying to make sense of the images swimming in front of him. She sinks the fingers of her left hand into his hair and makes him look her in the eye.

Her right fist is white knuckled around his jacket. Slowly, deliberately, she raises it between them for a moment. Makes sure he sees it before her elbow snaps straight, hurling it behind her.

And then she is on him again. She tugs his shirt tails free. Sends her fingertips on a quest for every last spot that leaves him breathless and straining toward her. Her mouth works furiously up one side of his neck, chases up and across his chin and starts down the other side.

His mind is so hazy with scotch and desire that he wonders at her coordination. Just then her lips stall against his jaw. She makes a frustrated noise and he realizes that she's working on the buttons of his shirt from the bottom up.

He seizes the moment. His hands slide over her collarbones, thumbs teasing her chin up and up until his lips meet hers. A different kind of kiss this time. Slow and warm and promising. He doesn't quite know where he finds the will to insist on this.

It even works. For a moment, anyway. Her fingers still against his stomach and she is _with _him in the kiss. The quality of the world changes entirely. A soft sound of realization passes between them.

It doesn't last, though. He feels her tense. Her fingers close convulsively around the fabric of his shirt, tearing a button free. It drops and skitters away across the floor as she breaks the kiss. Her teeth close around the very tip of his earlobe. She bites down hard and moves on. The backs of her hands play against his stomach as she awkwardly tries to undo the next button from the inside.

He sighs and drops his forehead against her temple. His hands drop to her forearms. He can't quite bring himself to fight her.

"No," he says flatly. Louder than he meant to.

Her head jerks back. Her hands stay where they are.

"I didn't come here for . . ." he hesitates, ". . . for drunk, angry sex."

She's looking at him like he's crazy and with her fingers, warm and wicked, on the bare skin just above his belt buckle, he thinks she's probably right. He pulls her hands away. Keeps hold of them.

"I'm not . . ." he makes a noise of frustration, "_we're_ not kids, Kate.

She huffs in annoyance, "_We're _not?"

She tries to pull her hands from his. Usually he'd let her. Maybe this is where they keep going wrong. They hit the wall. She retreats. He lets her. Because he's afraid of pushing? Because it's easier?

Not this time.

He squeezes her fingers harder than he means to. She hisses, suddenly remembering the burn. He sees it, too. Absently brings it to his lips for a moment and doesn't let go, "No. We're not. I have a past. So do you."

She gives him a hard look.

He gives it right back, "If you want to talk about . . ."

If he says that name, she _will _hurt him.

He catches a hint of the fury and rushes on, "I have no idea what you want to know. What you _don't _want to know. But you can't use the fact that I had a life before I met you as an excuse . . ."

"An _excuse?"_ The words burst from her.

". . . an excuse to count us out."

She startles into silence. They do _not_ talk about this. Not in so many words.

He wants to laugh at the look on her face. Wants to give thanks to the strange angel that helped him get it right for once. Get _this_ right for once.

He settles for kissing Kate one more time. Light. Playful. Over in a second.

He walks her two steps away out of the corner and looks her in the eye. Makes sure she's listening, and drops her hands, "I have _never _looked at a woman the way I look at you, Kate."

He reaches behind him and opens the door. His eyes are still on her as he ducks around it and out into the hallway. He has to go, whether she says anything or not. Whether or not he thinks he might have seriously underrated the healing properties of drunk, angry sex.

The door is all but closed when she finally speaks, "I'm burning your jacket, Castle."

He laughs. Surprised. Delighted, "Do what you have to to do."

He pulls the door shut.


End file.
